When packaging soft food products, such as fresh chicken, fish and other meat products, in portion carriers, it is important to obtain a well-packed portion carrier with a pleasant visual appearance. Packaging of such products may occur manually, i.e. sorters standing along a conveyor package them manually. However, it is also important that the packaging process is fast and efficient. Therefore, automatized arrangements for packaging of soft food products have been developed, in which arrangements the food may be delivered to suitable portion carriers by means of packaging robots. Such packaging robots usually include a claw, which holds the food product during transportation to the portion carrier. When the claw is positioned above the portion carrier into which the food product shall be delivered, the claw is opened and the food product falls down into the portion carrier.
With these known automatized methods and devices it is difficult to control the positioning of the food product in the portion carrier. Hence, the space in the portion carrier may not be efficiently utilized. This may lead to several disadvantages such as need for more storage room in production facilities and in stores, and higher transportation costs per weight unit of food. Another disadvantage is that the food in the portion carriers might be positioned such that the visual appearance of the product is unattractive for a potential buyer. Furthermore, it is not possible to influence the shape of the food product with these known automatized methods and devices without cutting the food product. Cutting of the food product is undesirable for at least two reasons, firstly, the customers most often want to obtain “whole” products and secondly, cutting requires another process step, which adds complexity to the process and potentially gives increased costs.